The United Nations (UN) is an international organization whose stated aims are to facilitate cooperation in international law, international security, economic development, social progress and human rights issues [1].

What's available on its web site

Almost all UN bodies that produce sales publications make most or all of these resources freely available online. Links to masthead documents and Official Records appear throughout the UN’s many sites, but the documents themselves are usually available only in ODS. The principal topics of UN information include the following: human rights, including civil, political, cultural, economic, and social rights; international and national security; sustainable economic development; the environment; international law; and humanitarian affairs.

Does the UN sell its own publications?

Vendors that distribute UN documents and publications

UN blanket and standing orders

UN Publications makes all Official Records and sales publications, as well as particular monographic series and serial titles, available via standing order. The sales publication categories and their codes are as follows:

UN Sales Publications

CODE

CATEGORY NAME

0

UNIDIR and Miscellaneous Publications

II.A

Business, Economics, Science and Technology

II.B

Economic Development

II.C

World Economy

II.D

Trade, Finance and Commerce

II.E

Economic Commission for Europe

II.F

Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific

II.G

Economic Commission for Latin American and the Caribbean

II.H

Public Administration

II.K

Economic Commission for Africa

II.L

Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia

III.A

United Nations University

III.B

United Nations Development Programme

III.C

International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women

III.D

United Nations Environment Programme

III.E

United Nations Industry and Development Organization

III.H

United Nations Population Fund

III.N

United Nations Inter-regional Crime and Justice Research institute

III.P

International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia

III.Q

United Nations Human Settlements Programme

III.R

United Nations Office for Project Services

III.S

International Organization for Migration

III.T

International Trade Centre

III.U

Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees

III.W

International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda

III.Y

United Nations Research Institute for Social Development

IV

Social Questions

V

International Law

VII

Security Council and Peacekeeping Operations

VIII

Transport and Communications

IX

Disarmament and Atomic Energy

X

International Administration

XI

Narcotic Drugs (including the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime)

XIII

Demography

XIV

Human Rights (including Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights

XV

United Nations Institute for Training and Research

XVI

Public Finance and Fiscal Questions

XVII

International Statistics

XX

United Nations Children's Fund

Approval plan

None

Subscription databases

COMTRADE
Contains more than 700 million records covering over 40 years of detailed trade information.

United Nations Treaty Collection
The Collection consists mainly of the digitized treaties contained in the Treaty Series, which contains the international agreements of international governmental organizations (IGOs) and member states.

Monthly Bulletin of Statistics (MBS) Online
MBS Online presents current economic and social statistics for more than 200 countries and territories of the world. It contains over 50 tables of monthly and/or annual and quarterly data on a variety of subjects illustrating important economic long-term trends and developments, including population, prices, employment and earnings, energy, manufacturing, transport, construction, international merchandise trade and finance. A subscription to the printed version of MBS includes access to the MBS Online.

The languages of its products

Almost all UN information resources are available in English. The exceptions include more than 100 monographs issued in Spanish each year by the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC). Many UN publications are available in only English and French, or English, French, and Spanish.

UN policy mandates that all masthead documents and Official Records be issued in the United Nations’ official languages: Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian, and Spanish. However, the UN has fallen short of this ideal.

Copyright/public domain

All sales publications are protected by copyright. Masthead documents and Official Records are in the public domain.

Indexes to UN publications

United Nations Bibliographic Information System (UNBIS):

UNBIS is, in effect, the catalog of the Dag Hammarskjöld Library at UN Headquarters. Unfortunately, many of the Library’s holdings—particularly those issued before 1980—are not represented in this database. UNBIS records for masthead documents and Official Records frequently provide links to full-text documents in the Official Document System of the United Nations (ODS).

AccessUN:

AccessUN, a product of Readex, contains records for thousands of items not represented in UNBIS or ODS.

New title RSS feeds and e-mail newsletters

The UN Publications main page includes a link to a customized e-mail notification service providing announcements of new titles. Click on Subscribe to our E-news in the left sidebar.

Quirks

UN depository libraries may receive a 25 percent discount on all nondepository publications and databases they order or subscribe to. However, this applies only to purchases made using a single, designated account. It publications are ordered using any other account, UN Publications will charge the full price for those items.

All orders must include sales publication numbers.

The search function on the UN Publications site requires exact matches in all instances. This applies even to punctuation. For example, while there are several matches for ‘earth’s living’, there is none for ‘earths living’.

Does the UN explicitly state how long electronic documents remain on its web site?

All masthead documents and Official Records will remain in ODS permanently. There is no policy on the retention of web pages and digital sales publications that can be accessed on various UN sites.

Preservation/digital archiving program

From their web site: "ODS covers all types of official United Nations documentation, beginning in 1993. Older UN documents are, however, added to the system on a daily basis. ODS also provides access to the resolutions of the General Assembly, Security Council, Economic and Social Council and the Trusteeship Council from 1946 onwards. The system does not contain press releases, UN sales publications, the United Nations Treaty Series or information brochures issued by the Department of Public Information."

ODS is free!

Publication information for subsidiary bodies

For detailed information on information resources of major UN bodies, follow these links: